According to the [Chicago] Tribune, the school's fence is adorned with thousands of green, blue, purple, and red strips of fabric -- each hand-tied by a student. A sign by the gate stated that the elementary school will "be the first Chicago public school to march in the city's gay pride parade." The sign also stated that the school believes that family means everybody.

According to the Chicago Tribune...

Think about this a moment. Children who are, by every standard, too young to make any critical decision on whether or not homosexuality is healthy-- let alone moral --without instruction from adults. It is the SCHOOL's belief that "family means everybody", not the children.

This is outrageous. American children are so far behind the rest of the world in the essentials of classical education; science, literature, history, you name it. But lessons American school children seem to excel in are multiculturalistic, humanistic hoo-haw, and social indoctrinational curriculums espoused by the liberal teachers unions. Our children are being taught to be liberals... not intelligent free-thinking individuals.

They can be taught that anal/oral sex, i.e.; Homosexuality and Lesbianism, are socially acceptable behaviors, but the Bible cannot even be allowed on campus, let alone its God invoked over lunch without consequence.

This is the world we live in: That which is moral is being taught to as immoral and hideous, while that which is immoral and hideous is being taught to as moral.

Let me ask you a question. Does God exist? And if so, which culture's interpretation of Him is most accurate? Is Hindu's depiction of the supreme being ("beings" in the case of the Hindu) the most faithful to what God Himself has revealed to man? What about Islam? Is Islam's vision of God the most faithful interpretation-- His intent and motives towards man? How about Judaism? Christianity? Which of these four major philosophies are the truest expression of the God of the Universe-- assuming He does indeed exist? What can we know about God from the teachings of each of these four disciplines?

Hinduism: from ReligionFacts.com

The most well-known Hindu saying about religion is: "Truth is one; sages call it by different names."

However, there are some beliefs common to nearly all forms of Hinduism that can be identified, and these basic beliefs are generally regarded as boundaries outside of which lies either heresy or non-Hindu religion. These fundamental Hindu beliefs include: the authority of the Vedas (the oldest Indian sacred texts) and the Brahmans (priests); the existence of an enduring soul that transmigrates from one body to another at death (reincarnation); and the law of karma that determines one's destiny both in this life and the next.

Note that a specific belief about God or gods is not considered one of the essentials, which is a major difference between Hinduism and strictly monotheistic religions like Christianity, Judaism, Islam and Sikhism. Most Hindus are devoted followers of one of the principal gods Shiva, Vishnu or Shakti, and often others besides, yet all these are regarded as manifestations of a single Reality.

The ultimate goal of all Hindus is release (moksha) from the cycle of rebirth (samsara). For those of a devotional bent, this means being in God's presence, while those of a philosophical persuasion look forward to uniting with God as a drop of rain merges with the sea.

"As a drop of rain merges with the sea"? Is that all God is? A bucket that eternally collects drops of water that drip from a cosmic spigot? Occasionally dropping some that evaporate and eventually find their way back to the spigot?

Naturally, as anyone who knows my religious bent can tell you, I reject this altogether. God is not so impersonal and devoid of compassion as to create us (assuming He does anything of the sort, according to the Vedas) only to take all our experiences upon death and absorb them for Himself, stripping the soul of any sense of personal identity.

"...as a Muslim you don’t know if you go to heaven or not, because God is going to review your past, and it depends on how much good you’ve done. He decides. I wouldn’t know."

In fairness to the genuine teachings of Islam, the Qu'ran teaches that Faith, not Works, gets one into heaven... or so say some Muslims. Most of modern Islam accepts "Suicide as Martyrdom" as a tenet of Islam. They accept terrorism as a legitimate tool of jihad. They accept the subjugation and brutalization of women. They accept the desire to see Israel utterly destroyed as a sanctioned tenet of Islam. In this, Islam and Christianity have one thing in common: They are both confused about what their sacred texts actually say. Another difference is, the teachings of Qu'ran are both confusing and contradictory from one Surah to the next. In contrast, Christianity (again, my personal bias is showing)-- it's text, the Bible --is a unified manuscript in both theme and message, despite being written by 40 writers over a period of some 1600 years. The Qu'ran cannot boast this even though written by a single man over the span of a single lifetime. To further cast doubt upon the Qu'ran is the division that occurred shortly after the death of Mohammed-- Shia and Sunni. Islam has been in conflict with itself ever since.

As to Christianity, it is an out-flowing from Judaism, a religion it is completely compatible with despite Christianity's rejection of Temple worship and many of the Levitical laws. All of Judaism is fulfilled and rolled over (401k-like) into Christianity in some form; Christ, second member of the Godhead and God incarnate, is the fulfillment of Old Testament worship.

Many non-believers view the teachings of the Bible as confusing, and to one extreme, a religion of blood. The difference here is not that blood permeates 'the muslin of the remission of sins, and of salvation,' but that it is the blood of a single man, the blood of God Himself, and not the blood of untold millions of infidels, the enemies of Allah.

The world, right now, is caught up in a moral struggle the likes of which the world has never seen. Three religions vie for dominance of the hearts and minds of peoples and cultures across the globe-- Atheism, Islam, and Judeo-Christianity. Atheism and Islam are both on the rise and account for the majority of hearts and minds in the world today. The Judeo-Christian faith has never been in dominance, though it has dominated era's. Christianity, unlike atheism, Islam, or even Hinduism is different in that no one is "born" a Christian. One must choose, in the fullness of one's allotted time, to be "born again"-- Christianity is a faith that depends solely upon volunteerism. The ranks of Christianity comprise what can only be described as a wholly "volunteer" army. Islam on the other hand, again in fine contradictory fashion, views man as created with free will for the sole purpose of obeying and serving God-- Born a Muslim, supposedly with free will, but given no choice but to obey and serve.

Setting Islam aside for a moment, if you judge the state of the world based upon atheism/human progressivism alone; the tenets they espouse, practice, and seek to impose upon the world, these are just some of the results:

Modern Slavery

There are more slaves in the world today than in any other time in history, some 27 million.

There are about 42 million abortions per year, or about 1.3 every second.

Homosexuality

About half of male homosexuals die before age 42.

78% of homosexuals are affected by sexually transmitted diseases.

Euthanasia

Colombia, the Netherlands (Holland) and Belgium have legalized euthanasia.

68% of the elderly in the Netherlands fear being killed without their consent.

The ACLU

The ACLU defended the website of the North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA), which provides guidance on how to seduce and sexually molest boys without getting caught, yet sued to prevent the singing of Christmas Carols in public facilities.

ACLU’s founder Roger Baldwin stated,” I am for socialism, disarmament, and, ultimately, for abolishing the state itself… I seek the social ownership of property, the abolition of the propertied class, and the sole control of those who produce wealth. Communism is the goal.”

Proof of God’s Existence

If an E. coli bacterium were disassembled into its component parts (atoms), the probability that it would spontaneously reassemble is estimated at one chance in 10100,000,000,000.

How big is this number? Compare it to the number of atoms in the universe, which is 1080, and impossibility or the miraculous, which is anything less than 1 chance in 1050.

The Evolution Lie

Proteins are needed to make DNA, yet DNA is needed to make the proteins that make the DNA!

Evolution cannot explain how a system with multiple subsystems like the eye can evolve when all of the parts are needed for the system to function as a whole but none of the parts alone confer any survival advantage and so would not have been concentrated in the population.

Global Warming Scam

Manmade CO2 is less than 1/1000th of total greenhouse gases. Water is by far the most predominant greenhouse gas!

Newsweek stated in 1975 that global COOLING evidence has “begun to accumulate so massively that meteorologists are hard-pressed to keep up with it.”

World Government

The European Union was formed by stealth over a fifty-year period by first uniting economically, which created the political infrastructure. It was then only a small step to political union. Before Europeans knew what hit them, the sovereignty of their countries was surrendered to the EU.

The same thing is being engineered in America today by members of the CFR, Trilateral Commission and Bilderberg Group, globalist groups which have infiltrated the highest levels of power.

This is what the world is like WITHOUT adding Islam to the mix. This is what the world is like WITHOUT Christianity as a major guiding influence in the affairs of men and governments.

Christianity has never been able to build God's Kingdom on earth-- it is not within the Church's pervue --because man has genuine free will. Each and every man, woman and child born beneath the sun must choose to accept Christ and have his or her heart changed. Most will never choose Christ over the world. Christianity doesn't seek to impose itself upon the world (which is why there is so much darkness in the world). But Islam does.

Are Jehovah's Witness's Christian? Jackson was raised as a Jehovah's Witness and was considered a member of that cult until 1983, but did he ever accept the Lord Jesus Christ as his savior? Did he ever repent of his sin?

These are questions to consider in everyone's life, for what shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world, and lose his own soul; or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? It is a pearl without price; its worth impossible to measure, even if one could fill the vast emptiness of space-- the entire universe! --with gold. The very truth of the matter is: Fill the universe with cold hard cash and still you couldn't buy your soul from God.

May he rest in peace, but... without Christ they'll be no peace for Michael Jackson.

Two more hours of work comprising minor touches... subtle. Total work time is now 19 hours over a week and three days. My first post on this project comprises three days worth of work.

The beach now has a sandy texture, but there's still a tweak or two left to do. I've added several layers of shading on the surfboard to give the edges some depth and lighting. A new shadow for "Creative..." that only affects the surfboard, and a new shadow for the surfboard that only affects the tree's trunk. Also, a touch to subtly lessen the stark transition between land and sea.

Things still to do:

Surfboard Ornamentation

Floral Touches in the upper right hand corner and along the bottom

Perhaps a coconut drink with umbrella, straw, and a little lipstick

I haven't decided whether or not to put a surfer girl in the background. If I do, it'll be a back-shot in bikini, with windswept hair. But that's a major undertaking. Should I decide to go there.

Say hello to more wave detail, and a rudimentary beach. Say hello, also, to another hour and a half.

If I had to guess where I am with this piece, I'd say I'm somewhere between 50 and 70% finished.

It's shaping up nicely, considering I had no picture in my head whatsoever when I began this. It started with script, which made me think of the beach, which made me think of surfing, which led to the tropics and coconuts, and then to a great big wave.

Here we have some ocean. This took a few tries... using some photos for an idea of how the water breaks over the top. Finally got it right after three hours.

I had to move the script down and creating a new clipping mask for the scripts shadow. Here you can now see what I spoke of in part 2... the script's shadow is visible on the board and bole, but not on the waves. This adds to the over all depth of the composition.

"Mark my words. It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking. We're about to elect a brilliant 47-year-old senator president of the United States of America. Remember I said it standing here, if you don't remember anything else I said. Watch, we're going to have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy.

"I promise you it will occur. As a student of history and having served with seven presidents, I guarantee you it's going happen. I can give you at least four or five scenarios from where it might originate. And he’s gonna need help. And the kind of help he’s gonna need is, he’s gonna need you - not financially to help him - we’re gonna need you to use your influence, your influence within the community, to stand with him. Because it’s not gonna be apparent initially, it’s not gonna be apparent that we’re right.

"I promise you, you all are going to be sitting here a year from now going, 'Oh my God, why are they there in the polls, why is the polling so down, why is this thing so tough?' We're going have to make some incredibly tough decisions in the first two years. I'm asking you now, be prepared to stick with us. Remember the faith you had at this point because you're going to have to reinforce us."--October 2008

A fine example of prepare for the worst, [hope, lie, finagle, anything but pray] for best. But, perhaps Joe's prophecy has some merit.

Joe said this testing of Barack's mettle would be "a generated crisis". Well this is self-fulfilling, as Barack has managed to create the crisis that is our one-trillion a year deficit, but hey, like Rohm said, "you shouldn't let a good crisis go to waste"-- even if you have to manufacture a few of your own --because it allows you to do more than you would otherwise have been able.

All that aside, then there's the crises that are NOT generated i.e.; manufactured.

Take Kim Jong Il, the colossal waste of human intellect, dictator, equal opportunity rapist of North Korea, chief propagandist and distorter to the North Korean people's world view, and all-around starver and oppressor of the general population. This man, in direct defiance of the U.N. [further proving that particular body's ineffectual penchant for publishing resolutions it has no ability to enforce] has tested a few underground nukes, and launched numerous missiles... again, in defiance of the U.N.

Now the NORK king is stating that he will launch a long-range missile in the direction of Hawaii... on the fourth of July no less! And he defies ANYONE who should choose to provoke him.

Is this a crisis-- generated or otherwise --that could fall under Biden's prophecy?

What will Obama do? What specifically is it about 'what he will do' that won't be readily apparent to Americans that he is doing the right thing? Will he apologize to the NORK king for America's colonialistic aggression and arrogance the way he's apologized to Europe and the Muslim world. Will he bow to the NORK king like he did to the Saudi king? Will what Obama ultimately decides to do, should the NORK king make good on his promise, create in the mind of some Bin Laden wannabe the image of America as a paper tiger, just as President Clinton did when he tucked tail and ran after Mogadishu? Would such an impotent response lead to another 9.11, that a republican president would have to clean up, like Bush cleaning up after Clinton loaded the bases in the run up to 9.11?

This president is looking to be, more and more each day, the greatest presidential disaster this nation has ever seen. Even worse than Jimmy Carter. And that's saying a lot.

When Barack looks at the Constitution he sees "a charter of negative liberties," rather than a charter of vast liberties given to the states. Obama bemoans the fact that the Constitution too clearly fetters and limits the power of the federal government. But what does that matter? He's tearing the Constitution down at every opportunity. The very document he swore an oath to defend, he deliberately and concertedly tears away at, liberty by liberty; taking the shackles the constitution places on the federal government and placing them instead upon the American people.

As for Biden and his astounding prophecy? Well, even a broken clock is right twice a day. But hey! July Fourth is still two weeks off. Maybe the NORK king will, and maybe he won't. But one thing was made evidently clear yesterday: Obama will swat and kill flies but he won't stand up to tyranny, in any form, unless they are tyrannies he perceives America to be guilty of.

This version is a step up from yesterday's. Today we have the bole of a coconut palm, in the rough... there's still work to be done on the tree.

Add another four and a half hours of work to the project; all toward creating the tree.

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[Thanks go to Ben for suggesting and actualizing the clipping of the script's shadow, even though the effect won't be noticed until something other than black resides in the background. Assuming also, that the script stays where it is at present]

This project, so far, represents about seven hours of work. Approximately five on the script and two on the surfboard. Don't read too much into the black background, consider it instead an empty slate, 'cause that's exactly what it is.

There will, of course, be waves, and I'm considering the bole of a palm tree behind the board on the left. Aside from those features the design is pretty much up in the air.

On a side note, 'Learn to Surf' is on my list of things to do before I die.

Using his law enforcement experience and data drawn from the FBI's behavioral analysis unit, Jim Kouri has collected a series of personality traits common to a couple of professions.

Kouri, who's a vice president of the National Assn. of Chiefs of Police, has assembled traits such as superficial charm, an exaggerated sense of self-worth, glibness, lying, lack of remorse and manipulation of others.

These traits, Kouri points out in his analysis, are common to psychopathic serial killers.

But -- and here's the part that may spark some controversy and defensive discussion -- these traits are also common to American politicians. (Maybe you already suspected.)

Yup. Violent homicide aside, our elected officials often show many of the exact same character traits as criminal nut-jobs, who run from police but not for office.

Perhaps this is why so many politicians on the Left so vociferously defend Tiller, who was, by every measure, a serial killer. What about Barry Soetoro Obama's pathological deconstruction of American culture, commerce, security, health care, and basic constitutional rights? His philosophies are anti-American. But then, so is much of the Liberal Left. Oh, well.

I found an old roll of film last month. Judging by this photo the roll was six years old, at least. Only about half the pictures developed.

This was on the wall of Dothan's only Goth/Alternative club. It has since crept away into some shadow more welcoming than south Alabama down-home sensibilities.

I'm surprised how well this one turned out considering I didn't use a flash AND.... it was raining. I remember getting near soaked taking this picture. I'm not sure how many pictures I took of this wall, but five developed. This was the best.

Obama went down to Egypt and cited what he called the "holy" Koran numerous times. He called for common ground among all faiths, declaring that Iran had the right to a nuclear facility for energy... huh? They have oil, why do they need nuclear power for energy? We all know they want a nuclear bomb.

Obama then threw Israel under the bus and told her to stop with her developments and the security of their nation, and then recites the Koran over and over in his speech. This is the very book that calls for Muslims to murder the Jews.

Why is this so dangerous for America? In Genesis 12:3 God says that He will curse those that curse Israel and bless those that bless Israel. I believe one of the only reasons God’s wrath has been delayed for America is because of our support for Israel, and now America has withdrawn this which puts us at great risk.

Add this to the national tipping point that brings God’s wrath. In the book of Nahum 3:19, the prophet Nahum shows up in Nineveh about 150 years after Jonah to tell the nation that God is not going to give them the chance to repent this time, but His wrath is going to come upon them. Why? Because in Nahum 1:11 we read that the people had begun to "plot evil against the Lord." Rejecting God is one thing, but plotting evil against him is the tipping point.

On June 1, Obama signed a proclamation that declared June as "Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, And Transgender Pride Month, 2009." Combine Obama’s throwing Israel under the bus and his 100 plus days of plotting evil against the Lord and I think we may be at, or near, that tipping point. The next few months will reveal whether this is true or not. In fact, when God finally chooses to bring His judgment on America, it would be a waste of time to even pray for mercy. No need for a national day of prayer.

In Jeremiah 7:16 God Himself declares to Jeremiah not to pray for Judah. "Therefore do not pray for this people, nor lift up a cry or a prayer for them, nor make intercession to Me: for I will not hear you." In Jeremiah 15:1 God tells Jeremiah, "Even if Moses and Samuel stood before Me, My mind would not be favorable toward this people." Then in Ezekiel 14 God says that when a nation sins against God in persistent unfaithfulness He will stretch out His hand against it. In verse 14 God says, "Even if these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they would deliver only themselves."

America has been turned upside down. We are in a time when men call Good evil, and Evil good. Tiller is elevated to sainthood, while any Christian unafraid to speak out against abortion, homosexuality, or any other moral ill is branded a kook at best, a terrorist at worst. Perversion is lauded and held up high as a virtue among other such liberal paragons and shibboleths, while biblical morality is first reimagined to laud and support the aforementioned paragons and shibboleths, but scorned and reviled when employed by more fundamentalist, back to the garden, believers.

Obama is destroying America, and no one seems to care.

We deserve whatever befalls America. What might this mean for true Christians? Whatever prayers they offer for America's repentance may only save themselves.

Changes have been made. And they include altering the direction of the wood-grain, throughout, and adding lighting effects to Creative.

Changing the direction of the wood-grain gives the tree and dandelions a more organic feel. This same change beneath the grass allows for greater definition and distinction between earth and sky; there's a shearing effect now just below the grass that convincingly separates earth from sky-- I'm happy with it. I haven't decided whether or not to add any highlights to Hegemony.

The highlights give Creative a 3D feel... more depth, and breaks up the monotony of the wood-grain. Hegemony is broken up by the rays of light, so I thought to extend the faceted feel to Creative by creating two curved lighting effects and highlights at the top of each letter. I did have to spend some time correcting the curves of each letter so as to let the Stroke effect flow smoothly around each letter, but it was worth the effort. If I do anything else it will be to add similar lighting effects to Hegemony, but my thinking now is it would likely be an exercise in Overkill.

Here is the promised finished version. This represents approximately thirty-six hours worth of creative effort. Don't ask me how I gotfrom here to what you see now... I couldn't say. Maybe later I'll give it a try.